Sospiro e Sorriso
by Losavech
Summary: Feliciano has lost all will to smile or even feel any happiness at all since the incident from those years ago... and then he finds it again. Short one shot based on the song "Sigh" by Vocaloid.


_My sighs just wouldn't stop.  
Why have I become like this?  
I know this is no good.  
I'm sorry.  
My sighs just wouldn't stop.  
Why have I become like this?  
I must stop sighing. Swap yourself with happiness already!_

_Sigh (translation) – Kagamine Rin_

* * *

Feliciano sat on the park bench and sighed.

Well of course he did. That's all people ever saw him do these days after what happened those years ago. But what did happen?

No one knew for sure because he never spoke of it. It was as though the memory of it had been erased along with his former happy self. It had to have been horrifying if it were to have altered him so devastatingly and drastically.

All he would do was sigh and wish for his happiness to return again, though it never did. He'd sit there with his head down, staring at something when there was nothing in front of him, and then the usual depressed sigh would pass from his lips—the same lips that had once brightened everyone's day by just seeing its smile. Most people forgot what that smile looked like back then.

His eyes seemed dead too. They used to glitter and gleam beautifully before the event years ago, but after the happening they grew hard and never had that spark again. The golden amber turned to a more dull gold instead after the years went by, and it wasn't to anyone's surprise that they would.

It was never to anyone's surprise when he sighed either.

Feliciano shook his head in his hands and asked God to convert this lonesome life into happiness again, or to at least give him one reason to smile. A smile could possibly fix things. Maybe if he knew why he was so sad in the first place, he could replace the sadness with what he had before, though even he could barely remember what it was that he felt before that incident.

It was no use anyways. The boy got up and walked off, glancing back to the bench where he had sat for those few hours as though maybe something would be left for him if he looked. There was nothing.

"Figures," he thought out loud before letting out yet another sigh.

* * *

_Just how long has it been?  
It's not even supposed to be fun,  
but I, without a clear purpose,  
was searching for the seed of sighs._

* * *

He continued walking and waiting. Waiting was now a game to him, though it was never an enjoyable game. It was his own way of searching a reason for why he sighed so much, why he couldn't smile anymore, and why everything had seemed to have lost its… spark—the little reminders of why he should be happy.

Where had that spark gone?

A bridge came up as he sauntered on, but there was something odd about it. It had to have just been the sun rays with it being such a sunny day and all. Feli looked up to see a young boy standing there in front of him, big smile on his face and what looked to be a sort of outline of wings behind him, but then again, it had to be the sun rays.

For whatever reason, Feliciano saw him as familiar in some way, yet he couldn't put his finger on it at all. Instead he just felt a blissful happiness rush over him, tears beginning to form at the corners of his eyes as well as a smile finding its way on his lips for the first time in years.

He would have run up to him and hugged him if his knees weren't wobbly. He would have started balling and sobbing if it weren't for them being caught in his throat. He would have done anything if he could, yet all he could do was stand there with tears rolling down his pink cheeks.

"I'll take away your sighs and replace them—all of them. Instead you shall have happiness," the boy said, a beautiful white flower appearing in the palm of his hand. The child held it out towards Feliciano, urging for him to take it.

And he did just as the near silent whisper slipped from his lips.

"Please."

The boy was like an angel from a far-off memory. Suddenly everything around them became more vivid—like Feliciano was seeing it through new eyes. Little things of happiness surrounded him; the birds fluttering by and chirping, a rabbit hopping by the babble of the clear stream under, the beautiful smell of the rose bushes by the bridge's ends and the flower in the boy's hands... all of them bringing the simple pleasures back into Feliciano's heart.

He had forgotten what these felt like. And suddenly he wasn't sighing anymore, but smiling—a real smile, one so similar to the ones from the past. But each of those returning pleasures and happiness brought back a memory of the boy in front of him.

And suddenly, it hit him. He felt winded as the memory came back to him strong and clear. The tiny bits of happiness that had returned to him shattered as he finally remembered who this boy was.

He was taken back to those few years ago, though they felt like centuries and centuries ago had passed since then. The vision of himself beside a hospital bed was made before his eyes, and next to him was someone who looked like they were sleeping peacefully.

But then there was a piece of paper placed over his sleeping expression. His younger self began crying and clinging to the dead boy's hand, begging for him to wake up. Feliciano shouted and screamed for him to awaken despite the fact that he couldn't hear him. He was already in a faraway place beyond Feliciano's world, unreachable and long gone.

He was only a young boy with a horrible sickness. He had smiled just the day before. Why couldn't he smile again? Why couldn't he cup Feliciano's cheek with his hand… the cold, cold hand that was wrapped around a much warmer? Feli pressed that hand to his tear-stained cheek, twining his warm fingers around his brother's, yet his fingers were already cold as ice.

The sobbing boy gave out a warm breath on those cold fingers as though that would keep him warm. Maybe if he could feel that warmth again, he would come back.

Then again, he couldn't feel anything anymore. How could a person feel something if they were dead?

But that didn't mean Feliciano ever stopped the gentle breaths, so long as his brother in heaven could feel them somehow.

Lovino was his brother's name. He was the brother that died when he was eleven, around the time that Feliciano was nine. They used to be best friends despite the age difference between them. They were close, but no one ever told Feli of how his brother was on the brink of death at such a young age because of a disease.

And no one told him that Lovino had a weak immune system because of birth defects. No one really told him anything because apparently Feliciano was too young to understand the idea of his brother dying.

No, they just let him walk in the hospital room and say his last goodbyes to his dear brother before the monitor rang with the beep that signaled death.

Feliciano choked out a sob, a silent scream as he doubled over and tried to gasp for breath.

"You remembered, huh?" That familiar voice. So soft.

Small arms wrapped around Feliciano as he cried, cool but tingling with a soft warmth that matched the boy's—his brother's voice.

"They were yours, weren't they? The 'sighs'?" Lovino asked, holding Feliciano in a loving embrace. "You were trying to warm me up—a gentle, gentle wind…" He paused a moment before whispering apologetically, "Sorry for being late. Finally I could come and return the favor."

He let go, taking a step back into the rays of sunlight.

Feliciano looked up, eyes wide and somewhat confused, the last of his tears silently streaming down his cheeks.

"No more sighing now."

With this and a bright smile of his own, Lovino faded into the white sunlight.

And after wiping the tears away, Feliciano smiled.

A true, brilliant smile.


End file.
